Getting married: The reception pelamin

Some of you who have been reading this blog would know that I had a pelamin dilemma, but I managed to get it sorted out.

The dilemma

We already booked a banquet hall at that time. Signing up for a package with Felda D’saji meant that I’d be getting a complimentary pelamin. I considered to rely on the pelamin by Felda for a moment, but after going through the options given to me, I thought that none of them suited what I had in mind.

I wanted to hire someone else to handle the pelamin, but was faced with several problems. First, I’d have needed to pay a surcharge of RM1500 for hiring an external vendor. Second, not many vendors were willing to take up decorations jobs at Felda halls because of the time constraint placed upon them.

At the last minute, I listened to Mama and relunctantly agreed to using the Felda pelamin. I told the guy that I wanted this 3-panel pelamin and have all the flowers in white. I added on white curtains behind the pelamin to replace the hall’s brown curtains. Adding on the white curtains cost me a ridiculous amount of RM600 (especially when it’s stained).

I listened to my readers who were previously in the same dilemma, who suggested that I improvise. The day before the reception, I brought home lots of flowers and subbed the decorating job to my aunts, who came to my house to arrange it and brought it back home to continue arranging it.

I also commissioned AzuraAzwa to make some changes to the pelamin. Hours before the event, AzuraAzwa added white carpets on the stage and installed LED lights to make the stage look more presentable, while my aunts arranged some of the flowers on the stage.

The result of everyone’s contribution is a modest and pretty pelamin, that turned out a lot better than I expected.

Lessons learned

When you have to deal with a complimentary pelamin, you can still make it work! Get resourceful and skilled friends and family to help you sort it out. With additional white curtains, real flowers, carpets and better lighting, you can make a difference.